Overwhelmed and Excited at the same time
Lists. Lots and lots of lists. And a binder. With tabs. These are the things that keep me calm. Well, calmer than life without them.
I have a list for "City Wrap Up". One item is emptying the flat so we can have the floors done and the walls painted. It's been many a year since those have been done, and now that we are getting another place in the country with more room, and owning just enough furniture for a one bedroom flat requires we take what we have as we don't have a "furniture magic wand". On the list are also items like "get car serviced" - which is pretty new too since we only got a car a few months ago - my first one in over 20 years!
Let me backtrack a bit. I'm a city girl. Growing up in suburbia, I dreamed of living in the city. It's all I ever wanted. Houses, cars, yards were never my thing. As soon as I would enter the city, even when young, my body felt electrified. The life, the diversity, the noise, the smell - all woke up all my senses and I could not get enough. I have lived my dream for over 26 years and feel blessed that I have been able to do so. I've been through a lot in the city. The good, the bad, the ugly, but mostly the joy and excitement of having everything at your fingertips. It was my playground.
Then Covid came. The silence during lockdown...the silence of the humming of lives being lived. The sirens, those didn't stop. Walking around streets to forage for food whilst avoiding people when you are used to being squished in a subway car with more than can fit was shocking. Almost as shocking was seeing refrigerator trucks at the back of hospitals, and a tented hospital camp set up in Central Park. Things eventually started to reopen, but a bit more than I was ready for. I really didn't want to be near someone I didn't live with anytime soon. Our plans for my big birthday trip were cancelled, along with so many other plans. We decided to go somewhere for a couple of weeks to get some space, and nature, and Vermont is what came up on the radar. Who knew how much that trip would affect us.
Everything just happened serendipitously. We found that almost everyone in Vermont was taking this covid thing seriously. Really seriously. This was amazing. It didn't hurt that there were less people. And the views that went on forever, the mountains, the rivers, the trails... and no one was on invading your space. It was truly freeing. And it slowly came to be a necessity of my mental health to have this space around me. People would say hello - EVEN TO STRANGERS. This was a totally new thing. We drove around to many areas of the lower part of the state, saw many beautiful sunsets and ice beds and swam in fresh rivers. The swimming took place the first days of the trip as by the end of the trip we were coming back to the house we rented to with the heat blasting. It was only mid-September. But we didn't care, lets light up the wood burning stove! We love fireplaces, but these stoves were the icing on the cake. How can we get one? Hmmm... The idea slowly entered our heads separately. Then one day we had brunch at a little cafe. Across the road an artist was selling her wares, we ended up chatting to her and she casually mentioned her son was in real estate. Then we were off for the day on another adventure. Something (it was most likely the cafe my husband is obsessed with) pulled us back to that town. We went to look at the board on the side of the real estate office to "take a look" to see what was available. As is the case during these times, the notices didn't seem updated. I said, lets go to the front, perhaps there's info there. We walk up, and the son of the artist opens the door, lunch in hand, asking how can he help? We look at each other, say we're "just looking" and end up sitting down and discussing something that neither of us had verbalised to the other yet. But we were in sync. This was something we should investigate. Next thing we know we're looking at a house that day in a nearby town. This was not like me. I had not researched, or really planned anything. We didn't know one town from the other except for some of the "tourist" sites that we had been tracking down, along with every covered bridge I could located.
I've always believed that things happen for a reason, and this was the beginning of the next phase of our lives.
Until next time...
I have a list for "City Wrap Up". One item is emptying the flat so we can have the floors done and the walls painted. It's been many a year since those have been done, and now that we are getting another place in the country with more room, and owning just enough furniture for a one bedroom flat requires we take what we have as we don't have a "furniture magic wand". On the list are also items like "get car serviced" - which is pretty new too since we only got a car a few months ago - my first one in over 20 years!
Let me backtrack a bit. I'm a city girl. Growing up in suburbia, I dreamed of living in the city. It's all I ever wanted. Houses, cars, yards were never my thing. As soon as I would enter the city, even when young, my body felt electrified. The life, the diversity, the noise, the smell - all woke up all my senses and I could not get enough. I have lived my dream for over 26 years and feel blessed that I have been able to do so. I've been through a lot in the city. The good, the bad, the ugly, but mostly the joy and excitement of having everything at your fingertips. It was my playground.
Then Covid came. The silence during lockdown...the silence of the humming of lives being lived. The sirens, those didn't stop. Walking around streets to forage for food whilst avoiding people when you are used to being squished in a subway car with more than can fit was shocking. Almost as shocking was seeing refrigerator trucks at the back of hospitals, and a tented hospital camp set up in Central Park. Things eventually started to reopen, but a bit more than I was ready for. I really didn't want to be near someone I didn't live with anytime soon. Our plans for my big birthday trip were cancelled, along with so many other plans. We decided to go somewhere for a couple of weeks to get some space, and nature, and Vermont is what came up on the radar. Who knew how much that trip would affect us.
Everything just happened serendipitously. We found that almost everyone in Vermont was taking this covid thing seriously. Really seriously. This was amazing. It didn't hurt that there were less people. And the views that went on forever, the mountains, the rivers, the trails... and no one was on invading your space. It was truly freeing. And it slowly came to be a necessity of my mental health to have this space around me. People would say hello - EVEN TO STRANGERS. This was a totally new thing. We drove around to many areas of the lower part of the state, saw many beautiful sunsets and ice beds and swam in fresh rivers. The swimming took place the first days of the trip as by the end of the trip we were coming back to the house we rented to with the heat blasting. It was only mid-September. But we didn't care, lets light up the wood burning stove! We love fireplaces, but these stoves were the icing on the cake. How can we get one? Hmmm... The idea slowly entered our heads separately. Then one day we had brunch at a little cafe. Across the road an artist was selling her wares, we ended up chatting to her and she casually mentioned her son was in real estate. Then we were off for the day on another adventure. Something (it was most likely the cafe my husband is obsessed with) pulled us back to that town. We went to look at the board on the side of the real estate office to "take a look" to see what was available. As is the case during these times, the notices didn't seem updated. I said, lets go to the front, perhaps there's info there. We walk up, and the son of the artist opens the door, lunch in hand, asking how can he help? We look at each other, say we're "just looking" and end up sitting down and discussing something that neither of us had verbalised to the other yet. But we were in sync. This was something we should investigate. Next thing we know we're looking at a house that day in a nearby town. This was not like me. I had not researched, or really planned anything. We didn't know one town from the other except for some of the "tourist" sites that we had been tracking down, along with every covered bridge I could located.
I've always believed that things happen for a reason, and this was the beginning of the next phase of our lives.
Until next time...